Perspectives - Saving Folder Options

In OF1, I could Take a Snapshot of my current view with folders opened or closed. I’m unable to do that in OF2 or am I missing something? Whenever I edit or activate the Perspective, the folders open and remain open.

I have a screenshot of the Projects view just to show what I’m trying to achieve.

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I got a response from Omni today. This is an OF1 feature, and it’s currently not available for the initial OF2 release. I’m hoping it returns because I use it a lot. I’m curious if anyone else is using this feature in OF1.

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Yes, I’m using this as well and think it is very important to save within a perspective if a Folder/Project is expanded or not.

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This is the first time I’ve written but I feel really strongly about being able to save the expansion state of a perspective and I think the Snapshot feature was a very useful feature in Omnifocus 1. I like to have a Today at work list where essentially I have all the Forecast items for the day but filtered by my @work context (as well as other several other work contexts; delegate to staff lists, follow up for work etc) so the only items visible are due today. I do this by selecting the contexts and Grouping by Due but with Omnifocus 2 I have to wade through “Within the last 3 months”, “Within the last month”, “Within the last week”, “Yesterday” and then finally Due Today. Each one of these has to be closed to get to Due Today so I can see all the work tasks Due Today (and not older items that haven’t cleared). Whereas with the Snapshot feature it would remember the expansion state I preferred which can be very useful for other perspective queries

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This is a very important feature to me and I cannot believe it’s not available in OF2. Drives me crazy every time I use it to the point where if it’s not fixed I’ll seriously consider other software. No joke. It’s that distracting to me.

I’m very disappointed in how OF2 implements Perspectives. I absolutely hate that they removed the ‘snapshot’ functionality and that folder expansion selections are not persistent. This is a serious usability issue they need to address quickly.

There’s some good stuff in OF2, but between this issue and the data density issue, I’m seriously considering going back to OF1 and then given that it won’t be supported moving forward, looking for alternative software to use. Both of these are issues for me to the point where I find myself not wanting to use the software, mentally cringing every time I switch to it. That’s not conducive to productivity.

I’ve used OmniFocus since the day they released it. Literally. I bought it on day 1 and have been a strong advocate for it. I purchased OmniWeb back when it was a paid app, own licenses for OmniOutliner and OmniGraffle. I’m a fan of their work but there is a LOT I cannot stand about OF2 to the point where I went from really excited to download and fire it up to now looking for alternatives. Problem is, there are very few out there worth anything, and nothing as robust as this. So I either have to resign myself to continue using this with a UI that right now I visually hate, or settling for a lesser product.

Bummer.

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Agree with all the comments above! I used the Snapshot feature in OF1 extensively to set my view preferences. The status of folder expansion is a HUGE pain to have to manually restore every time you shift between perspectives. Click-click-click-click-click-click-click down the folder list… what a waste of time! As expressed by others above, it is hard to believe this feature was left out, and very annoying. From a longtime OF1 user…

Oh my gosh, this is maddening!! Why in the world won’t my folders stay closed?!?!?!

The worst part of it is that SOME of my folders stay closed and some don’t. Aggravating!!

Please fix this soon! This destroys the customizability of perspectives if my folders all open every time.

WAIT, I GOT IT!!!

I called Omni and they walked me through it. Here is what you do (assuming you are in OF 2 Pro):

  1. Bring up the perspective you want to have folders collapsed in.
  2. Once the perspective is up, and you can see it with the folders open, go to View --> Collapse All (or you can manually collapse which ones you want closed)
  3. Once you have it the way you like it, click the “View” button in the toolbar (the eyeball) and it has a Save button!!
  4. Click Save and now your folder status is saved along with the other components of the perspective.

Why they don’t have this Save button in, you know, THE PERSPECTIVES WINDOW (!!!), is beyond me, but that is how your do it. Hope it helps someone. It was literally driving me insane.

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I still struggle with SnapShotting my folder expanded/closed.
This is absolutely essential for me and my workflow of creating projects in mass and then filing them into folders after creating them in in mass.

Any update on how to do this? I find the save state to be greyed out.